A grandmother has criticised a shopping centre’s ‘lack of visible security’ after irreplaceable baby pictures of her four grandsons and a cash present for he daughter were stolen.

Norma David, 80, from Stanton Close, Orpington, also warned others to be careful after her purse was snatched while out shopping at the Walnut Shopping Centre in Orpington.

She was out shopping with her husband on Friday, February 17, and had visited Poundland, Romans, and M&Co as part of the trip.

Mrs David believes it was while looking at a jumper in M&Co that a lone woman carrying a blouse – to whom she did not pay enough attention to be able to describe in further detail – took her purse from her handbag.

“I suddenly felt my handbag was light and when I looked inside my purse was gone,” she said.

“I was very shaken. I’ve never been robbed before, or known it to happen to people around here.

“I was annoyed that I didn’t feel someone doing going into my handbag.”

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Inside her purse was £100 in cash that she intended to give to her daughter as a birthday present next month, and baby pictures of her four grandsons, who are now aged 30, 29, 13 and nine.

Mrs David said there are not enough visible CCTV cameras or security guards in the shopping centre in Orpington High Street, and believes that if there were, it would act as a deterrent to would-be thieves.

“I think it’s disgusting,” she said.

“All the other malls, wherever you go, have the cameras there and you see security walking around, but I don’t see any of them in the Walnuts.

“I think it would stop thefts like this.”

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She also offered the following advice to other elderly people: “Hold your purse and don’t take so much money out with you – just enough for what you need.”

Martin Price, Centre Manager at The Walnuts Shopping Centre said: “We take the security and safety of our visitors very seriously, and CCTV in the common areas of the centre is monitored by our security officers at all times.

“We cannot comment on the arrangements made by individual stores within the centre”

To offer information, call the Metropolitan Police on 101, quoting crime reference number 3303201/17.

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